Teacher removed from John F. Kennedy High School in Granada Hills

Los Angeles Unified’s inspector general has opened an investigation into allegations of fraud, forgery and theft at John F. Kennedy High School in Granada Hills, district officials said.

A teacher at the center of those allegations, Leslie Garcia, was removed from the school, Los Angeles Unified District Spokesman Thomas Waldman confirmed Wednesday.

A student at the school, Gabriella Orellana, said Garcia was last seen at the school a day after she and other students were questioned last week about forms they are required to fill out to verify attendance at an after-school program.

“She (an investigator) showed me the sign-in sheets and I told her they’re not my signatures and I wasn’t there,” Orellana said of questions she answered during an interview with an investigator last week.

Garcia could not be reached for comment. Messages left for her and principal Suzanne Blake were not returned.

The after-school program receives funding based on the number of students who attend classes, which Garcia was tasked with teaching.

The federal funding is for LAUSD’s Beyond the Bell branch, which contracts a private organization, ARC, to administer the program, ARC Co-President Gary Lipsky said.

“We’re working with Beyond the Bell in trying to figure out if (the allegations) are true or not; and if they’re true we’ll take action as well,” Lipsky. “If she stole money, we could possibly press charges or take that money back.”

Senior Jonathan Vasquez said Garcia would cancel classes, which were held both before and after school, only to demand students sign sheets stating they attended.

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“She would still have us sign that program sheet saying that we were staying after school, or coming in early,” Vasquez said.

Orellana remembered Garcia cancelling several psychology classes but asking the students the next day to sign forms stating they attended the classes she had canceled.

“We never really questioned it,” Orellana said. “She told us it was a way to keep attendance.”